


The Gift of Pumay

by ck_suitcase



Category: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra | Phantom of the Opera & Related Fandoms
Genre: F/M, Mirror Bride, Romance, Short Chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-01-09
Packaged: 2021-03-13 01:13:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 1,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28519938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ck_suitcase/pseuds/ck_suitcase
Summary: Erik knows the secret to perfection, to a lasting marriage and endless love. There is no flaw so fickle or crippling as a living soul.
Relationships: Christine Daaé/Erik | Phantom of the Opera
Kudos: 9





	1. Vision

I did not love a woman when I decided to marry.

Do not misunderstand—that is not to say I was not in love, but the only love I knew at that moment was the love of a creator for his art. I completed my opera that evening, my life's ambition, and the plan to make _her_ erupted in the glorious aftermath of my success. My mind was abuzz with the incomparable high of completion. It seemed that nothing could be beyond my reach, not even a bride.

I tried to make her like other brides at first. It became an endless exercise in frustration, attempting to mimic living features with porcelain and wax. I did not know what my wife should look like. I had never seen her. And all the real womanly faces I could recall were drained of color and screaming.

No, of course she could not be like other brides. None of them could ever endure me. There was only one thing I wished to be with forever, only one thing that truly made me happy.

I made her from music.

Her chest was the flushed red wood of my favorite violin; her hair, the strings. I dismantled the pipes of my organ and made them her beloved arms. I dressed her in blank sheets of parchment, marked with empty staffs without any notes. My vanity demanded I clothe her in my own compositions initially, but the red ink of my work appeared too much like blood and the color ruined her image.


	2. Silence

The night she was completed, I vowed never to use my voice again.

It was not a planned commitment, but neither was it a hardship to maintain. A ghost with so little as a speck of talent did not require a voice to keep his domain sufficiently haunted. Notes were already my preferred method of communication. The only person I spoke to with any semblance of regularity was myself. Finally, most importantly, singing was not an integral part of making music.

Even if it had not been easy for me, I would have sacrificed it for my bride. It felt as necessary as the lock on her glass encasement. I must not speak, and I must never touch her. Those were the terms of perfection.

I was content to abide by them. She was my ideal companion, a comforting presence in my home, and the most polite of audiences. I could never disappoint her. I believed she would never disappoint me. Years passed before I realized what a foolish notion that had been.

It was my own doing. I should never have attended the performance.


	3. Voice

The voice that came from the stage that night was not extraordinary. Perhaps, if it had been, I might have been able to simply listen with surprised appreciation from my private box and return home to my wife, eager for an encore but otherwise unchanged.

The source of the voice, a woman, was in the chorus—and that placement suited her well. This singing blended. It smoothed the edges of the harmonies surrounding it, its steady pitch and clarity operating in service to others searching less certainly for their assigned notes. This voice helped them. The group was made better atop the bedrock of its competence, and it was done so unobtrusively, it was at times impossible—even by my ear—to isolate the individual sound from the collective whole.

It took a solo, a short and unremarkable passage which could have been cut from the production with no significant loss, for me to take notice of this voice at all. And yet, once I had, I could not stop considering its mastery of assimilation. How very patient it seemed among the other voices. How… kind.

I returned home, to peace and unbroken quiet. I looked upon my bride.

She smiled as she always smiled, but, for the first time in our life together, her unflinching regard left me unfulfilled.

“I know what you sound like,” I told her, the words a whispered rasp, an imposition, and a betrayal.


	4. Imitation

I hated the voice for stomping upon my contentment.

Though my bride remained as faithful a companion as any man could ever hope for, I began to find the conditions of our marriage dangerously lacking. I wanted more. The relentless siege of disappointments that defined my life ought to have taught me better than to long for things outside my control, but the dissatisfaction persisted. Tormenting me.

I attempted to make her sing through simple automation, implanting a revolving disc and a fine-toothed metal comb into the widening portion of violin body that comprised her collar bones. A music box, a voice box. I agonized over song choice before settling upon the notes of those brief, solitary lines that had first brought the voice to my attention. I planned to expand her repertoire infinitely in the future.

Then I wound it, and the chimes of music sounded directly from her, fashioned to mimic the delivery of the voice to the smallest quavering detail. The result was delicate, tinkering, and cut through the quiet of the house with the sparkling solidity of a gemstone. It was near-perfect. It may have even been enough—had I been able to forget the helpful, distinctly emotive appeal of its inspiration.

I, however, could not devise a method to tamper with my memory without considerable risk to more important, potentially vital mental processes.

The experiment only worsened my burning restlessness.


	5. Division

I surrendered to my shameful craving for the voice and began to lead a life fractured down the middle. It was a clean break. Consideration for my wife demanded I keep the two halves of my existence unmistakably separate. 

At home, I was once more her silent and devoted husband, performing in her honor, basking in her company, delighting in her smile.

My time away, though, was spent in pursuit of the voice that should have by all rights belonged to her. I attended every performance, focusing on the chorus to the exclusion of everything else. And, after each ovation, I formed a very bad habit of taking to the catwalks in search of more words and notes, needing to know how my wife would sound behind the curtain.

These actions, like any sufficiently potent elixir, had an unintended side effect. I learned a great deal about the woman called Christine Daae. 


End file.
